Does Washington Want Normal Diplomatic Relations With Venezuela?

While President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela and the new President of Colombia, Manuel Santos, met in Santa Marta, Colombia, last Tuesday and agreed to normalize relations after a fierce diplomatic fight, there are no indications that such détente is in the cards for Venezuela and the United States. Washington, it now appears, may not even want to maintain ambassadorial relations. This could be a significant turn towards the worse for the United States’ already rocky relationship with its third-largest oil supplier.

Back in June the Obama Administration announced the appointment of Larry Palmer, President and CEO of the Inter-American Foundation, to replace the current ambassador in Caracas. The Venezuelans gave their initial approval. But then came the U.S. Senate confirmation process. Although there were no major problems in Palmer’s testimony before the Senate on July 27, Palmer was subsequently asked to respond to questions from Senator Richard Lugar, the ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Palmer’s answers to these questions were presumed to be for the Senators and not for the public, but a week later they were posted on Senator Lugar’s website. Unfortunately Palmer wrote some things that a candidate for ambassador would not say publicly about the host country. He referred to “morale” in the Venezuelan armed forces as “considerably low” and to “clear ties between the Venezuelan government and Colombian guerrillas.” There were a number of other remarks about Venezuela that most governments would consider quite unfriendly or even insulting.

Alan K. Henrikson is director of diplomatic studies at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. "While we would expect candid answers to queries from a Senator that were supposed to be confidential, the publication of such comments -- considered hostile and demeaning by the host country -- is extremely unusual,” he said in a telephone interview. “Many countries would not accept as ambassador, someone who made such comments while being considered for appointment."

It didn’t take long for this to be all over the news, especially in Venezuela. President Chávez announced on Aug. 8 that Palmer was not acceptable, and appealed to President Obama to appoint another ambassador. According to congressional sources here, the Lugar questions to Palmer and the leak of his answers is seen as a “set up from the right.” But there is no indication so far that the Obama Administration is going to replace Palmer with another choice.

Washington is a city of diplomatic intrigue, and there is an interesting “whodunit” aspect to the diplomatic row. Was this leak simply the work of Lugar’s office, or was it done in collaboration with officials in the State Department who wanted to torpedo the nomination?

Whatever insider game is going on, the sabotage of this appointment is yet another clear indication that Washington is not ready, or willing, to even try to normalize relations with Venezuela. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s gratuitous public insults to Venezuela –- widely condemned when Chávez engages in the same behavior towards the United States –- are another indicator that high-level officials here do not want to normalize relations.

What the Obama Administration doesn’t seem to realize – or perhaps care about – is that this will also alienate most other governments in the region. The Administration’s strategy is almost always oriented towards the media, and they may succeed in convincing most of the media that any fight with Venezuela must be the fault of Chávez. The Washington Post editorial board wasted no time in hysterically blaming Venezuela for the problem. But every Latin American diplomat will see -– given the offensive character of Palmer’s written statements -– that Venezuela cannot accept this nomination. Like the Obama Administration’s efforts to help the coup government in Honduras gain international legitimacy over the past year; its continuation of the Bush Administration’s trade sanctions against Bolivia; and its expanded military presence at seven military bases in Colombia and now in Costa Rica, this diplomatic fight will sow distrust and further erode what is left of Washington’s credibility in the hemisphere.

Mark Weisbrot is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, in Washington, D.C. and president of Just Foreign Policy. He is also the author of the forthcoming book Failed: What the "Experts" Got Wrong About the Global Economy (Oxford University Press, 2015).